Wednesday, April 11, 2007

Alaa Al Aswani Disappoints with “Chicago”

I just finished reading “Chicago” – the novel written by Alaa Al Aswani (author of Omaret Yaquobian). What a disappointment that was!

The story follows the lives of several Egyptian graduate students and college professors studying and teaching in the University of Illinois. I guess it’s meant to be a look at the dynamics of Egyptians’ interactions with the west – their motives, influences, personality transformations, etc… Unfortunately, the outcome was a very shallow and clichéd view of the above as seen by a “leftist” intellectual. Just look at this summary of the main characters and how they’re portrayed to get a glimpse of what I’m talking about (warning: spoilers ahead):

Prof. Raafat: a professor of histology who has lived in the US for decades. He has rejected his Egyptian roots and lives like an American with his wife and daughter, only to be rewarded by his daughter becoming a crack addict, moving out of the house to live with her junkie boyfriend (who the father almost kills after he sees his daughter giving him a blowjob). The ultimate Egyptian fear of living in the west: that the daughter will become a slut.

Prof. Salah: Raafat’s colleague. He also been living for 30 years in the US. However, he lives an unfulfilling life with his American wife. He belatedly realizes that he has wasted his whole life by living in America. He regrets that he “chickened out” and left Egypt and left the woman he loved in Egypt and took the easy way out by immigrating. Becomes impotent with his American wife (who in a notable scene decides to fill the void that her husband left by purchasing a vibrator and becoming too attached to it). Salah abandons his wife, re-establishes contact with his Egyptian college sweetheart, tries to prove to her that he wasn’t a coward by attempting to give an opposition speech in front of the Egyptian president visiting the US but chickens out at the last moment, then shoots himself at the end because he can’t live with his true cowardly nature. Cliches galore with the Egyptian conventional wisdom that immigrating equals running away and giving up your soul.

Shaimaa: a graduate student from Tanta who’s in Chicago on an Egyptian government scholarship. She’s religious, stern, and approaching spinsterhood. Lonely in Chicago she meets another Egyptian student (Tarek) who she falls in love with, starts a relationship and starts having sex with him (no penetration), but still gets pregnant and has an abortion. America as the land where even the pious get corrupt.

Ahmed Danana: a graduate student who is really an Egyptian government agent. Got the government scholarship because he was an informant in Egypt. Is not academically qualified, and somehow he survives several years in one of the top US medical schools. He marries a rich girl from Egypt, but doesn’t mind pimping her out to the Egyptian mokhabarat officer from the embassy. Gets kicked out of his university, but is guaranteed another spot in another university because the embassy will guarantee him a spot. I guess he’s the symbol of the corrupt relationship between the tyrannical Egyptian government and the American administration.

Nagy Abdel Samad: another Egyptian graduate student. A patriot and a leftist rebel. Escaped the long hand of the Egyptian government but still tried to organize an opposition movement in the US, only to be taken in custody by the American anti –terrorism officers (framed by the Egyptian mokhabarat as punishment).

Carol: one of the few American characters in the novel. She’s the black girlfriend of one of the American leftist professors in the department. She can’t get ANY job because she’s black – not even as a dog walker (stereotyping at its finest). The only job she could get was as a nude model, and she has to sleep with her boss to get a promotion. Her boyfriend finds out and dumps her.

It’s apparent that the writer really doesn’t have a clue. He took the prevailing views that Egyptians have of how it’s like to immigrate to the west, how they think American society functions, the decadence, the moral emptiness, blah blah blah, and created a novel out of it.

actually i completely disagree. as an egyptian living in the u.s. i found this book to be SPOT ON. there was not one character in there who i couldn't relate to someone i know in the egyptian community. in fact, i found myself thinking that he must have lived in the u.s. at some point to know so accuartely how it is. perhaps your experience with the u.s. was different?

Well, his portrayal of Egyptians was much closer to reality. But what about his portrayal of Americans? The black woman who couldn't get a job as a dog sitter because she's black? The American wife, who at the first sign of marital strife, goes out and buys herself a vibrator? etc.....

By the way, the author did live in the US. He studied dentistry in Chicago.

gc,well yes i was mainly referring to the portrayal of egyptians which was far more interesting than the portrayal of americans mainly because no one's ever done it. the black woman who can't find a job is obviously over-exaggerated, true. i'm thinking he just put the americans in there for the sake of drama and page-turning but, as with Yacoubian, his picture of egyptians - this time in the u.s. - presents a reality that far too few of us are willing to admit. i think it will make a lot of people think seriously about where they will end up in 20-30 years if they choose to stay in the states.

Anon: No offense but that's bs. Egyptians like any other human can choose how they want to end up. I know a lot of egyptians (my parents included) that held on to their core beliefs - They've been in the states more than 30 years. Not everyone at the sight of freedom and normality has to turn into a whore/drug addict or lose their moral standing.

Another thing..why can't we look at this from another frame of mind? Maybe what aswany is trying to say is egyptians are corrupt no matter what. Even those given huge opportunities to change their lives to the better, still manage to mess up their lives. Instead of blaming the gov't for everything horrible in our lives, it's best to take a look and see how we can change for the better. Does that make sense?

Actually, I think the point the author was trying to make was very simply and clearly that if you want to follow the western model, most probably you will lose - i.e. for all those that think that the US is the land of dreams, think again.

Just finished reading too. It is very well written and tight as a novel, but in the end, it is naive and lacks anything more than stereotypically views ; Love of Egypt is Eternal; Leaving it is a risk of falling into sin; Arab Governments are corrupt and rotten (what is new?); Sex is great. cheers.

Very interesting take on the story, I like how you've broken down the characters. One thing about stereotypes though, I found that in life there are more stereotypical people than you would imagine. So maybe it lacks creativity as in finding those one off exceptions, however I'm not entirely sure it lacks reality, but that's just my naive view of life.

I agree, and you know what the only reason I think anyone likes Al Aswani is because of the blatant sex in his novels and the SHOCK factor, but honestly if you think about it, it's not breaking any molds.

Just finished the book last night. I did enjoy it very much. The book pulls you to keep on reading, you always wanted to know what is going to happen to the characters, and that's what you want from a novel.

To me, Al Aswani is very much Naguib Mahfouz, in style of writing. I saw all the characters very real. As Omar is saying, it is a painting of the Egyptian society today, and how every one of these characters is shaped by Egypt, Abdel Nasser, Sadat, Mubarak , etc. Our recent history created all these characters, and they are all Egyptians, and they cannot belong to any other society.

The sad thing that we are talking about ONE author/TWO books. In a country like Egypt we should be talking about, at least, 5 or more authors at the same level, as Aswani.

I am actually currently assisting in the translation of the novel into English, which is being put out through AUC Press just like Imarat Yacoubian, and I have to say that your take on the novel isn't fair. The book has some biases and unevenness but for the most part Aswani knew what he was talking about and the research he did on Chicagoan/American history is rather solid.

you know i went and bought it and he autographed it for me...a waste, clearly. however, i believe alaa el aswany actually went to that unviersity and lived in the states for a while...maybe he knows but just chooses to go all commercial.

anyway alaa el aswany's most serious, most damning problem as an author is that his characters are two dimensional, unlike those of naguib mahfouz. they don't have good, and bad, like real people. they're pretty black and white, while the poltlines are simplistic in the extreme. where are the uncertainties, the dilemmas? maybe he thinks an egyptian audience can't deal with nuance (which would be supported by all of our pop culture)?

Of course it is bad in the USA. And women there are sluts, and they all own vibrators. By the way, even sexually fulfilled women in happy marriages own vibrators in the West. Just to get... more fulfilled :P

And while all the things listed here COULD happen to people in America, most of them are also common place events that are shocking to the Egyptians only, I think (like blowjobs or premarital sex or unhappy marriages) and wouldn't raise a Western eyebrow. Therefore any Egyptian should seriously consider whether this is what they want to find in America.

As if there are no blowjobs, premarital sex, vibrators, racial discrimination or unhappy marriages in Egypt.

How can you possibly insult the man for writing about the true nature of the fear of egyptians living here and abroad:however misguided THOSE persons (and not himself) may be.

You have scantily clad neo-conservative, jingoist beliefs to discredit an A-political novel. And this has become a far too typical practice in current American society. And I might add that it is especially pernicious and often is derived from systemic problems. (such as the conservative, "anything that isn't pro-american is wrong" model thats been shoved down our throats for the passed 6 years.)

As an egyptian born and raised in America, the characters represent, if not exactly, the fears and biases that loom in the minds of egpytians of the dread "americanization".

Al Aswany doesn't, in my opinion, wish to portray the characters as his own concept of "inevitable" American corruption. Al aswany doesn't intimate that moving to the US is a forgone conclusion that will inevitably result in moral depravity and personal degeneration.

You read too literally and lose sight of the forest for the trees. The man is a genius and his character representation is precise and superbly accurate.

After reading this novel, your real problem, as an educated Egyptian, is.... where will you live???? Egypt, the ''circus with no fun land'', a Gulf country, where you will always be, in the best setting, treated like a third class human being fearing that you may be kicked out at any moment unintentitanely, or the west. After Alaa, the auther has damaged its face... poooor Egyptians, they will always be .... Egyptians... law lam akon mesreyan, lawadadtu an akoon.. ai genseyah feldonya

I, too, was very disappointed in the novel, which is now out in translation in the US and receiving huge promotions. I read it in Arabic, of course.It is extremely simplistic, trivial and poorly written. The characters (both Egyptian and American) are stereotypes, and the denouement (ending) profoundly unfulfilling. Even the use of sex and the continued reference to politics and corruption is superficial, stereotypical and soooo boring in 2008. Aswani's style is more like a TV soap drama "musalsal" than serious fiction. Unfortunately for all of us, his mixture of sex, politics and superficial characters is exactly what publishers in the Arab world and the US need to promote now. For Arab publishers (and governments), there is the pretense of allowing a dissenting voice to speak out on taboo subjects. In reality, his writings are no more profound than yellow journalism's reports of "scandals" (fada'eh). It may be sensational, but it is neither journalism nor, in this case, literature. For publishers in the US, this gives them a chance to promote an "Arabic" novel, a profitable endeavor given the public's interest in understanding something about the mess over there. And the heavy dose of sex satisfies the prurient peeping-tom mentality that is so prevalent when the west discusses the east (and its sexual hangups). But, in fact, publishers on both sides are promoting nothing of consequence, and nothing that requires profound thinking on the part of the reader. How sad.

On the other hand, let's admit Aswani's moral courage in what he does. And just the fact that he creates this controversy, and this interest in Arab fiction, is laudable. Just the fact that he is getting Arab readers to actually buy books and talk about them is a tremendous achievement. I don't care how he does it or why. Let's at least give credit where credit is due.

Chicago is a "spot on" reflection of Egyptian AND American pschological make up. I am Egyptian and have lived in the States for a long time, those who say it was a dissapointment are what I call the "appologetic" group , a group which does not (maybe cannot) see what they really are..or want to deny it..a pure Middle Eastern approach to problems. The book is a refreshing departure from the usual rhetoric, a must read.

Hi there!I've got the novel today and reached pp 65. I can't help telling the novel is so interesting so far. At least, it is some kindda lively experience -of some Egyptians living in the states- from which one may benefit a lot. Anyhow, I come back to you right after I finish it ASAP, Insha'Allah.

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